Anal car owners / Recommended car cleaning/care

[webley445]

Was wonder what others do/recommend concerning the cleaning and care of their vehicles.
I'm not talking about performance, I'm talking looks, so here are a few questions...

How do avoid water spots when you wash your car?
how often do you wash?

How often do you armor all? And what parts of the interior/exterior?
Do you armor all the rubber gaskets for the doors and truck?

What do you use for polishing the chrome?

What do you do for your tires appearance?

Any extra tips/tricks?

I end up going crazy and armor all everything. I use Wheel Wet on the tires, and try to limit washings to once every 2 or more weeks. i can't stand to wash and then have it look dirty the next day (not fresh). Otherwise I wash every couple of days.
I distrust automated washers as I always get lots of waterspots afterwards.

 

[WNG]

I'm not a slave to my possessions. Therefore I'm past the stage of worrying about how the car looks when it must face conditions no amount of washing and waxing can prevent the eventual.

But to offer some ideas...

Zano Brothers products are a premium car care line that has a loyal following, and I must say the results are impressive.

If you can't cotton towel dry the car, then buy a California Waterblade. It's a silicone soft squeegee for the body. Just run it over the cleaned body to dry the car in no time. A little toweling and you're done. Keep it clean between uses.

I avoid Armor-All for most of the interior. Hot weather simply causes it to evaporate onto everything you didn't apply it to. Worst is the window glass.
Doing the rubber gaskets is a good idea. Especially in cold climates.
The stuff is basically a silicone-water emulsion with some petroleum.
Just buy straight clear silicone.

White vinegar is a very good chrome polish. Takes off just about all stains.
Simichrome or Flitz is my favored metal polishes for tough stuff.

Tires...I just keep them aired properly. Armor-All isn't good for them.
Wax aluminum wheels religiously to allow brake dust to wash off easily each time.

Tips...
If you're spraying on Armor-All, especially on black/dark exterior trim... let it simply sit for a while to allow the water to evaporate out. Then the silicone concentrates and thickens. More of it gets applied to the surface than wiped off onto a rag and wasted.
This works well when it's hot out and not humid.

 

[ckthorp]

Armor-All causes dash cracking because is drives out the plasticizers. Ironic that it causes the problem it is sold to prevent.

I'm a fan of P21s products for exterior paint and wheels as well as Lexol Leather and Lexol Vinylex, for leather and vinyl respectively. The P21s wheel clearer works wonders on painted+clear coated alloy wheels.

To avoid water spots, I just use a drying product. I've been told a clean electric leaf blower can also work wonders, but haven't tried it personally.

Don't forget a clay bar. It's one of the best kept detailing secrets. Read up on it before trying. It can be done wrong with serious consequences, but is usually very safe.

Automatic washers typical recycle all of their water except for the final rinse. (At least I've been told this)

 

[Cuso]

Man I have to ask.... What so anal about your car???:lolsign:

 

[sejvaar]

I know a few A**hole car owners...is that the same thing?

 

[carbine15]

I wash the windows and headlamps so I can see. I believe a car needs only look good from the drivers seat. So every once in a while I'll clean and polish the hood only.
If it weren't for the protective layer of dirt my car would rust away.

For my tires I like to scrape the big chunks of mud off by rubbing them on the curb.

Chrome? There might be Chrome under there, but it's being protected by the layers of dirt and now pollen and fallen debris from the trees.



Seriously:

For waterspots use filtered water. Even after a machine carwash, take it home and hose it off with filtered water and it wont spot up on you. Not that I care.. I just know that this works. I think MrClean sells a water filter for your hose just for this purpose.

 

[waynejitsu]

Visit Waynestowels.com for detailing supplies.

I currently use-
The original 1Z products which are no longer allowed to be imported since the new VOC laws..., but I did order a lot "before" the law was in effect

Zaino also makes a great protectant for your paint.

To avoid spots-
Waffle Weave Towel x2, incredibly thirsty towel without the dreaded lint.

Wash-
I try for 1x a week, every other week atthe most.

Armor all? No...
Tiefenfhleger, imported.

Tires-
Tiefenphleger.

Chrome-
Chromephleger

Tips/tricks-
Electric leaf blower to remove the majority of water from the top, working down. I also works great to remove water from cracks and crevises.

Only use High Quality MicroFiber to prevent inducing swirls. (most do not realize that most swirls are self inflicted by using poor quality products).

The longest lasting protection for paint?
1Z (original Glanz) and Zaino

For tires-
NEVER use a solvent based dressing (usually blue or clear). If you ever have a tire problem such as premature cracking, discoloration, etc..., in many cases the warranty on the tires will be voided because the solvents cause premature failures.

Dash, trim, rubber-
Same as tires. Use only water based, Quality products.
Remember all the cracked dashes years ago?
That was from solvent based dressings and cleaners.

Run your fingers very lightly over your paint after washing.
Do you feel and roughness or is the paint as smooth as wet ice?
If it is not, you will benifit greatly from claying to remove all of the embedded contaminants.

Never use a waterless wash if you do not like swirls.

Hard time cleaning windows?
Try the Glass Towels-
No lint, No smudges, No streaks and no long glass cleaning. Honestly, I hated cleaning glass before I found these. Now, it is no problem and in a snap they are sparkling.

Glass can also benifit from claying.

Feel free to pm or email. I specialize in one on one help for car care.

 

[JackBlades]

I've been using the "Mr Clean" wash gun with the filter and get great results. The water in my area is so hard the spots can only be removed by waxing.

 

[Mikul]

I'm a recovering wash-aholic.

I used to wash weekly, wax monthy, and do a full clay-bar, polish, and wax 2x per year. It took 8-10 hours to do that last one.

First, do no harm. Have multiple, CLEAN, deep pile cotton towels for washing. The deep pile gives the dirt somewhere to go when you wipe it up. I just saved old towels from the bathroom. Whenever I needed a new one, I'd just pick one out and tell my wife that it looks pretty ratty and we should get some new ones. She's happy. I'm happy.

Don't use dish soap to wash your car, it strips a lot of the wax off. Buy a car washing product. Most of them are just fine. I have no preference.

Keep your entire car wet while you wash. If it even thinks about drying off, you'll get spots. Ideally, you should work in the shade. If you can't work in the shade and the temp gets over 83, you're doomed. Wait for the morning or evening. You might even be able to find a shadow when they get longer at these times. As soon as you're finished, dry it FAST. The California Water Blade is great for this. Just be sure to wipe the blade frequently to keep from accidentally scraping debris accross your paint.

Next: waxing and polishing are two separate processes. Polishing is REMOVING material. You polish to remove paint, water stains, and to smooth out scratches. You wax to fill in all of the microscopic imperfections in the paint. You can do both at the same time with one product and the results are pretty darn good, but not nearly as nice with two products.

My single product solution is Meguiar's Cleaner/Wax. It's cheap, easy to find, easy to apply and looks great. It hangs around for about 5 months if you're not picky about it. "Mother's" makes a similar product that I like too.

Favorite wax: I can't think of it. I used Mother's Carnauba Wax in a can (not the cleaner/wax) for a looong time. It always looked great, but I did find one that looked just as good, but was easier to apply.
Favorite Polish: 3M Imperial Hand Glaze. It also contains fillers to hide fine scratches and swirl marks. It's about as close to a miracle product as you can ask for.

P21s and Lexol are both great for the interior. I usually used Lexol because I could get it locally.

If you have black trim on the exterior, Back to Black from Mother's is your friend.

For the tires I used Eagle One Tire Shine. It's the only one that I found that lasted more than 24 hours. Eagle One would be bright for 3 days.

For the windows: 0000 Steel Wool. Try it. You'll be amazed. It's safe on tempered glass, but not normal glass, so don't try it on your mirrors.

I've never had chrome to polish, but Flitz metal polish cleans everything else really well and doesn't scour through the metal.

NEVER LET BIRD POO SIT ON YOUR CAR. I'm much less anal about my car today that I was, but I still have wet-wipes in my glove box for removing bird poo. It etches the clear coat in 12 hours, but you might be able to remove it with 3M's Hand Glaze. After 48 hours, you'll never get the etch mark off.

 

[tostada]

My car doesn't do anal. I brought her up better than that.

 

[tsl]

Was wonder what others do/recommend concerning the cleaning and care of their vehicles ...

This forum educated me pretty quickly ... it's the detailing equivalent to candlepowerforums.

http://www.autopia.org/

 

[Kristofg]

I discovered that the soap intake on my kärcher high pressure cleaner accepts turtle wax shampoo and "wax when wet" liquid. It considerably speeds up the washing and waxing time needed. (I don't know if it is any good for the kärcher though, but the car looks clean anyway)

 

[TedTheLed]

It sits outside so it gets rained on once in a while..

It used to vibrate like crazy until I discovered lumps of hardened mud clinging to the inside rims..(why do they design the wheels like that??) --took alot of water-blasting to get it all off..

 

[BUZ]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PkmZveqyU5E




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